


Tangentials

by Azzandra



Series: Philipa "Pippa" Trevelyan [1]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Drabbles, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Humor, Light-Hearted
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-06-02
Updated: 2015-10-03
Packaged: 2018-04-02 13:05:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 5,045
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4061089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Azzandra/pseuds/Azzandra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Moments in-between canon events, but just as important (though not always as serious.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Token of the Ear Scritcher

**Author's Note:**

> This is where I'll be collecting one-shots and drabbles about my main Quizzy. Some of this stuff is new material, some I posted to tumblr before putting it up here. No overarching plot and not in chronological order.
> 
> Summaries in order:
> 
> 1\. Token of the Ear Scritcher: Cassandra + Inquisitor. Cass wishes the Inquisitor would find some dogs to pet instead.
> 
> 2\. Flowers: Varric + Inquisitor, Solas, Iron Bull. During a village celebration, Varric discovers the Inquisitor and her other companions have slipped out to do something much more important.
> 
> 3\. Annoyance: Inquisitor + Dorian. The Inquisitor likes puns. Unfortunately.
> 
> 4\. Ambition: Inquisitor + Vivienne. Vivienne finds that the Inquisitor does have her admirable traits on occasion.
> 
> 5\. Old Habits: Inquisitor + Cullen. A Templar missteps, and the Inquisitor and Cullen disagree on how to deal with it.
> 
> 6\. Taste: Inquisitor + Solas. The Inquisitor wants to find Solas something nice to drink. It's a challenge.

 

As the sun began dipping behind the mountains, a murmur passed throughout the camp, wondering where the Inquisitor had gone to. The Exalted Plains were still relatively dangerous even now, with Freemen and the occasional demons still lurking around, and it wouldn't do to have her wandering around in the dark.

It was Cassandra, returning from the nearby stream where she'd scrubbed off the grime of the day, who happened to catch a glimpse of the Inquisitor by a rocky outcropping. She would have continued on to camp and left the Inquisitor to whatever she was doing if not for the... strange sounds she was making.

Cassandra approached to find her crouched before an entire pack of wolves. A sight which would have been much more alarming if she did not also have the Token of the Packmaster around her neck, but the entire thing still gave Cassandra pause.

Mostly because she was  _cooing_  at them. She was cooing at a pack of wolves.

Cassandra slowly stepped up next to the Inquisitor, cautious not to make any abrupt moves. The wolves were still lulled by the amulet's magic, but there was a difference between having it as a safety measure, and testing its limits like this.

"Inquisitor," she greeted.

Pippa Trevelyan's hand was outstretched towards the nearest wolf, who was watching her with curious yellow eyes. She stood still as it sniffed at her palm, and Cassandra felt a twinge of apprehension. Some creatures were unpredictable, and their behavior erratic and inexplicable. The Inquisitor was a prime example of this.

"Cassandra," she returned the greeting, and then added, "I'm going to give a wolf ear-scritchies."

"I see." After a beat of silence, Cassandra hazarded the question. "Why?"

"Don't you think wolves  _like_  ear-scritchies?" she said.

"I..." Cassandra was at a momentary loss at how to even address this. "That is not the issue. Inquisitor. Wolves are not pets. They are wild beasts. Treating them like friendly Mabari hounds is liable to get you a limb snapped off, even with the magic of the amulet protecting you."

"Maker, it's like you have no faith in me!" Pippa replied, sounding offended. "It isn't like I was planning to jump straight to the belly-rubs, I was saving that for the  _second_  date."

A few seconds passed in complete silence as she moved her hand slowly within the nearest wolf's field of vision, making sure her motions were obvious and non-threatening. 

"Putting aside the choice of words," Cassandra began.

"Yes, that was an unfortunate context for the word 'date'," she muttered, brows knitted together in vexation.

"Putting that aside," Cassandra said, "what is it that you hope to accomplish?"

"If I'm lucky, wolf pettings." 

Finally, her fingers brushed just under and behind the wolf's ear. Its nostrils flared, but it allowed the touch. Pippa wiggled her fingers, carefully at first, but then more firmly when the wolf pressed into the touch with a friendly whine, as if amazed by the experience.

Soon enough, all the other wolves were mobbing Pippa, demanding their own... ear scritchies.

She threw a smug look to Cassandra over the head of the furry crowd. Cassandra made a quiet, disgusted noise to herself.

The Inquisitor was going to give her a heart attack one of these days.


	2. Flowers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for the Dragon Age 100 Challenge, the prompt 97. Flowers.

While the village continued celebrating the closing of the rift, Varric couldn’t help but note that, somewhere between the third and fourth cask, the Herald of Andraste had gone missing.

There was probably nothing ominous about this. She enjoyed a bit of revelry as much as the next person, but there was only so much attention Pippa Trevelyan could take before she felt the need to slip out and find something quieter to do. But in Varric’s experience, it always did pay to double check, and he was left somewhat uneasy by the fact that Iron Bull and Solas were also nowhere in sight.

When he found them, it was in a meadow at the edge of the village.

“Oh, you’ve got to be shitting me,” Varric muttered, perhaps a bit too loudly, because it earned him a chastising glare from Pippa.

“Varric, language! There are children here!” she said.

There were, indeed, children. A dozen of them, all apparently engaged in trying to teach the Herald of Andraste and her companions on the correct technique for making flower crowns. Pippa already had one on her head, as did Solas. Iron Bull’s horns were bedecked in long garlands, expertly looped from tip to tip.

Varric sighed and sat down.

“Is this where you’ve been this whole time?” he asked. “No, thanks, I’m good,” he said to a child offering him a bunch of flowers.

“Not the _whole_ time,” Pippa replied, as she worked on her flower crown and tried not to move too much. A young human child, maybe no more than six summers old, was braiding flowers into her hair, and doing quite a good job of it.

Solas had finished his own flower crown and presented it to another one of the children, a little elven girl, for inspection.

“Well, that’s pretty good,” she said, eying it with an air of authority, “but it would look better with more blue.”

“Ah,” Solas nodded solemnly. “You are correct, of course.” He accepted a handful of blue flowers from the girl.

Iron Bull, despite the size of his fingers, seemed unusually skilled at the task. He finished a crown right before Varric’s eyes.

“Alright, who wants this one?” Bull bellowed. 

Nearly all the children raised their hands and shrieked, “Me! Me! I do!”

“He’s very good,” a young boy whispered to Varric, before pointing to the daisy crown on his own head. “He gave me the first one.”

“Come on, Varric, join in,” Pippa wheedled. “Take a load off. It’s no fun without you.”

Iron Bull leaned forward and waved the crown before Varric. The children immediately started begging Varric to take it, in remarkably well-coordinated high-pitched whining.

In the end, he had to accept just to make them stop.

And if he accepted instructions in how to make his own flower crown, it was only because the kid giving them was bossy. 


	3. Annoyance

“Hey, Dorian. Dorian. Why was the chevalier always changing his armor?”

“Why?” he asked warily.

“Because it was  _nevarrite_!” Pippa said, and promptly burst into raucous laughter.

Dorian stared at her mutely.

“Get it?” She elbowed him, jabbing him in the ribs with bruising persistence. “Nevarrite? Nev-er right? Get it? Do you get it, Dorian?”

“I get it,” he sighed, taking a long drink of his ale. “Unfortunately.” 


	4. Ambition

The Inquisitor picked up a book from the pile next to the banister. Then, with a frown, picked up the next one. Now exasperated, she picked up the third one as well, and stacked it on top of the first two.

“Vivienne! You have three copies of Hard in Hightown here?” she asked, rapping her knuckles against the spines of the books.

“Have I?” Vivienne asked lightly, not taking her eyes up from the alchemical treatise she was reading. 

“Are these from the library?" 

Vivienne spared one fleeting glance.

"I suppose they must be, darling. I only own the one copy, and it is certainly not so filthy as those.” She flipped a page. “People leave them here sometimes, when they are disinclined to take the  _long_  and  _hazardous_  trip down the stairs to the library proper.”

Pippa hummed as she balanced the stack on top of the banister. She picked up a tome from another pile. By the cover, Vivienne recognized it as a rare volume on the husbandry of dragonlings, only slightly scorched.

“You have a lot of books here,” she said, flipping through the pages. She stopped on one page in particular, her eyebrows rising at whatever was written there.

“From my personal collection at the Montsimmard Circle. I finally had them packed and transported to me.”

“Personal collection? We weren’t allowed personal collections at Ostwick,” Pippa said, a twinge of jealousy in her voice. 

“Yes, I am well aware of Ostwick’s shortcomings,” Vivienne said, delicately folding a bookmark between the pages of her book and putting it aside. “Is there anything I can help you with, my dear?”

“No, no, I’m helping the librarian track down all the missing volumes of Hard in Hightown,” Pippa replied, and sat down in the armchair across from Vivienne.

“That kind of errand is why we employ servants, darling,” Vivienne pointed out.

“Stealing job opportunities from hard-working Inquisitors!” Pippa replied, in a perfect imitation of bourgeois outrage, and then grinned with too many teeth.

Though endeared, Vivienne did not react outwardly with anything but a cool glance. “Indeed,” she said in an unamused undertone.

Pippa cleared her throat, disappointed her joke did not seem to hit its mark, and sat up straighter in her seat, one leg crossed over the other. 

Unconsciously, she seemed to be imitating Vivienne’s posture, and that pleased Vivienne more than her ridiculous antics.

“If you wish to borrow something,” Vivienne told her, gesturing widely to the stacked books, “you need only ask. I have several unique volumes even the Inquisition library is not likely to turn up.”

“Thank you, Madame Vivienne, but you do realize that now I will take that statement as a challenge.”

“Oh?”

“By the time I’m through, the Inquisition library will be unequaled even by the University of Orlais’ collection,” Pippa replied, a sharp glint in her eye. “Anything less is simply a benchmark on the way to that goal.”

Despite herself, a smile tugged at the corner of Vivienne’s lip. It pleased her whenever she saw these little signs, that the Inquisitor had a core of ambition buried under all that obfuscation. Truly, Vivienne believed, nobody lesser would have achieved as much. Pippa stayed to chat for a while, the discussion turning from books to politics, and then just as easily back again, until she had to leave so she would not be late for a meeting with her advisors. 

A scant minute later, she returned, looking a bit sheepish.

“The banister, dear,” Vivienne told her, without raising her eyes from her reading.

“Thank you, Madame Vivienne,” Pippa muttered, picking up the stack of Hard in Hightown and departing once again.

Vivienne couldn’t help the fond, unbidden smile, but at least there was no one around to see it. 


	5. Old Habits

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Warning for mention of rape in this chapter.**

It was, in all, a matter of timing. 

Perhaps not _good_ timing, necessarily, depending on who was was asked, but nonetheless.

The Skyhold courtyard was crowded when the Inquisitor returned, her arrival going with very little notice even for the fact that she'd only been gone on a routine foray into the Hinterlands. The battlements were manned as usual, meaning it couldn't be anything grave, but runners and servants were gathered around, gaping at the spectacle, and visiting dignitaries were pretending not to be enjoying the spectacle.

Commander Cullen was applying a tongue-lashing, very publicly, to seemingly the entire former Templar population of Skyhold. Pippa gleaned from this that something had happened in her absence, and the Commander was not pleased with any of the present company. By how many heads were bowed in shame, Pippa guessed it also had to have been something bad.

She broke habit that day and did not unsaddle and rub down her own horse, instead leaving it in Dennet's care with a query. _What happened?_ she mouthed to the horsemaster, as Commander Cullen's voice rang on the other side of the courtyard.

Dennet winced.

"One of them tried to do the Tranquil girl from the library an ill," Dennet answered.

Pippa's face went blank at this answer. She did not ask for clarification on what kind of "ill" Dennet meant, perhaps because she was well-versed in the ills the Templars delivered upon the bodies of the Tranquil.

Instead she went towards the thick of the crowd.

Cullen had to have noticed her arrival, or at least the gate opening, because of the makeshift elevated surface he occupied. The Templars might not have, being with their back to the gate and surrounded on all sides by gossiping crowds.

The air froze when she walked in on Cullen delivering a withering lecture on propriety.

"What happened?" she asked, her face serene and smiling and easy-going while her crystal staff, still strapped to her back, glinted in the sunlight, bright and damning.

All eyes went to the man kneeling besides Cullen, his hands bound in the fashion of prisoners waiting for judgment. 

It took a few too long seconds for the answer to come. Cullen's jaw worked soundlessly for a moment, before he swallowed dryly and answered. To his credit, he looked more ashamed than the prisoner, who simply looked sullen.

"Ser Gann was caught attempting to... molest a Tranquil," Cullen answered.

"Is that so?" Pippa said, deceptively calm, as if merely confirming a requisition. "Who?"

"Helisma."

"I see," she said, still that unnerving calm, her voice even. "Well, fifty lashes on the morrow. Now disperse, nobody's getting any work done like this."

She ordered the punishment so matter-of-factly, that some inertia kept the crowd gaping at her, waiting for more. Cullen had stiffened, in surprise if not anger, and Ser Gann raised his head to stare at the Inquisitor with something like dawning horror. His punishment, Pippa surmised, was going to be much more lenient at Cullen's hands. By the bloodshot eyes and unsteady tremor in Ser Gann's hands, she could guess why; the man was in lyrium withdrawal. Fifty lashes would put him at death's door. This did not change Pippa's mind in the least, however.

"Snap to it!" Pippa shouted, and the entire crowd collectively flinched. Servants ran to their tasks; runners ran to their destinations. The Templars were slower, scattering in confused clumps to every direction as long as it took them away from the Inquisitor's gaze. The visiting dignitaries immediately turned to gossip.

Ser Gann was remanded to the waiting jailors, who no doubt had a comfortable cell prepared just for him.

Cullen remained in place, displeased.

"I had things well in hand," he said, his voice soft but his fist clenched on the pommel of his sword.

"No you didn't," Pippa replied. She followed the statement with a dark, bitter laugh.

It was when Cullen finally realized that the Inquisitor was angry.

 

* * *

 

They had all incorrectly assumed that just because they'd seen her get into arguments, or just because they'd seen her raise her voice, that they'd seen her angry.

That was not so.

And perhaps Cullen had also assumed that if he explained how Ser Gann had not truly gone through with raping Helisma--except he did not use the word 'rape' so much as a sterile euphemism for the act--the Inquisitor would of course agree that fifty lashes was excessive.

That was also not so. 

Pippa took her departure from Cullen and the conversation, and went directly to her quarters, where she went through her usual routine after returning from long months on the road. She bathed, she ate, she sent her armor for repairs.

Then she arrived at the evening war room session looking as unflappable as ever.

"Well," she said, leaning with the flat of her fist against the table surface and looking down at the map, "the Hinterlands are about as wrapped up as they're going to get. Now what's this I hear about Darkspawn on the Storm Coast?"

"Inquisitor," Commander Cullen said quietly.

"I heard what you had to say, Commander," Pippa replied. "Now, about those Darkspawn."

"With all due respect, I don't think you did," Cullen insisted.

Josephine and Leliana's eyes were studiously glued to the map, as if nothing else in the room could possibly be more interesting.

"We've been receiving reports--" Josephine began.

"You risk alienating the remnants of the Templar Order," Cullen barreled on, "especially after you undermined me in front of them."

"You were not going to deliver adequate punishment."

"Even thirty lashes would have been enough--"

"Talking back."

"...What?"

"An apprentice I knew at the Circle once got forty lashes for talking back to a Templar." Pippa looked up from the map and fixed Cullen with a cold, cutting glare. She attempted to smile, perhaps, but it was so forced it ended up looking like an ugly grimace instead. "You think Ser Gann deserves less than that?"

"He didn't go through with it," Cullen said softly. "He was confused. He's in the early stages of lyrium withdrawal, sometimes that-- sometimes that causes confusion, not being sure of where or what or when."

"He didn't go through with it-- _this time_ ," Pippa corrected. "This time, Cullen. Don't play the lyrium withdrawal card with me. If he was confused about when or where he was, then that means he figured himself back at the Circle. It means raping Tranquils was such a well-ingrained habit that it came completely natural to him even when addled."

Her voice was a quiet hiss, and perhaps this deceived Cullen into believing she was merely emotional or upset. Leliana and Josephine, however, so well-versed in politics that they could read volumes into a twitch of the lip, saw the dark clouds long before he did.

"He's a good man, beneath it all," Cullen said softly. "I know him, he's... he tries. He's a good man."

"Beneath it all he's a rapist," Pippa replied bluntly. Then her voice lowered, something ugly and merciless bubbling to the surface. "Do you know the problem with Templars, Cullen?"

His jaw clenched in anticipation of cruelty.

"You never learned about consequences," she said.

Cullen frowned.

"You lived all your lives inflicting humiliation and pain upon the powerless, taking anything you felt like from them, and never suffered the slightest consequence for it. Even worse, thought yourselves _virtuous_ for it."

"Mages are not powerless," Cullen protested.

"And yet, it's consistently the most powerless who suffered the worst of the Templars' cruelty. Or are we forgetting that Ser Gann's intended victim was Helisma?" Pippa asked

This made Cullen's mouth snap closed with a clack. In the argument, in his fervor to defend Ser Gann from what he saw as unfair punishment, Cullen had lost sight of the original crime. 

"And you called Ser Gann a good man," Pippa spat contemptuously. "By what standard? Pray tell, what standards to Templars use to establish 'goodness' in a person? That he raped only those who were already Tranquil, and not those who were merely threatened with Tranquility if they did not submit? And even then," Pippa gave a hollow laughed, "you're sure he was so different from the rest of the Templars that he never did _worse_ than rape Tranquil?"

"You can't judge all of us by the actions of the worst of us," Cullen retorted.

"Oh, because only Templars are allowed to do that to mages, you mean?" Pippa retorted. "I assure you, I am only judging Templars by the actions which you all deemed good and acceptable. So tell me, Cullen, are you a good man?"

"I... what?"

"Are you a good man?" Pippa repeated slightly louder, anger boiling over. "Are you a good man, Cullen? Are you? Like Ser Gann, are you a good man?"

"I never-- I never raped anyone!" Cullen protested, bristling.

"So you're not a good man, then? You're worse than Ser Gann apparently?"

"No! It's not-- you're twisting my words!" Cullen protested. He was shaking with tension, hand gripping the hilt of his sword like a lifeline.

"I'm following your words to their logical conclusion, Cullen. Perhaps you should have considered them more closely before speaking them."

"Inquisitor..." Josephine touched Pippa's arm, and she ceased speaking. Instead she stared at Cullen, waiting for him to reply. Leliana and Josephine were stiff, caught up in the awkwardness of the room.

And Cullen's silence was deafening. 

When enough time had passed that Pippa thought her point had been made, she scoffed, looking back down at the map. 

"You're dismissed."

"Inquisitor--" Josephine attempted to interject, before Leliana grabbed her forearm and squeezed in warning.

"You're dismissed for today, Cullen," Pippa repeated. "Get out."

There was a finality in her voice that Cullen finally understood he couldn't challenge. Stiffly, he saluted and left the room.

His footfalls were heavy, resounding against the stone. The three women listened to every single one until the final door closed and they were lost in the clamor of the throne room.

Then there was a short, miserable sniffle, which Leliana and Josephine were surprised to discover had come from Pippa. Her face was flushed with more than anger; she had tears hanging heavy from her lashes.

"Your Worship--" Josephine said at the same time Leliana said "Inquisitor--", and Pippa shook her head furiously, cutting them off.

"No," Pippa said, voice strangled, and then in an unusually violent fit, punched the table. "Darkspawn! We've been receiving reports. Josephine."

A glance was exchanged, but it was clear the Inquisitor did not wish to address her distress. Instead, they launched into reports as Josephine dug out the relevant papers.

If later, a frilly handkerchief was passed to Pippa surreptitiously, none of them mentioned it.

 

* * *

 

In the late hours after the great hall was emptied, only Varric lingered by his fire.

Pippa sat down heavily at his table. It was after sitting that she saw Cole on her other side.

"Would it help if I killed Ser Gann?" Cole asked.

Varric looked up, sadness pulling at the corners of his eyes.

"Kid," Varric spoke softly.

Pippa shook her head, and picked up a playing card from the table to fiddle with it.

"No, Cole. I think it would make things worse."

"He's a bad Templar," Cole said softly.

"No, Cole. The worst part of it is that he's an average one," Pippa replied, and spoke nothing more for the rest of the evening.

 

* * *

 

In the end, Ser Gann got his fifty lashes.

Commander Cullen watched the proceedings in grim silence, and afterwards, to the attending Templars, said only that these were the consequences they could expect for their crimes. This wounded their collective ego as surely as Ser Gann's flesh was marred by the lash, but in their reaction, Cullen understood Pippa's accusations. 

"Not like the damn Tranquil are even bothered," one of the assembled Templars had muttered darkly, and Cullen heard.

'Better them than someone else,' Cullen found himself thinking, and a moment later grew nauseated with himself for the thought. So he turned to the Templar who spoke, instead, and stared him down.

"Unless you are angling for fifty lashes yourself," Cullen told him, "I suggest you wipe that thought from your head."

The man reeled, taken aback, and Cullen turned on his heel and departed before he could see if his words sank in.

 

* * *

 

Pippa did not apologize. Cullen even less so.

Things were awkward for a while, but time marched on.

And though eventually they put the incident behind them, neither truly forgot.


	6. Taste

Solas was interrupted from his studies by a steaming mug being placed on his desk, right next to his open book. He straightened up and looked to see the Inquisitor standing beside him.

“Try this,” Pippa said. And then added, “it’s not tea.”

Curious, Solas picked up the mug and gave it a sniff. It did not smell like any type of tea, indeed, but he was still unsure what this was about.

“Is there a specific reason I should be sampling a mystery liquid?” he asked before he drank.

“Because I am your dear friend and you trust me?”

“True, but that is only a reason to believe it is not poisoned, not a reason to actually drink.”

“Because of a sense of adventure?”

“That is a motivation, not a reason.”

“Because I went through all this trouble?”

“And that is a guilt trip.”

Pippa sighed loudly in exasperation.

“Because I’ll take it back if you don’t, and then you’ll never know what it tastes like,” she said.

“Ah. And that one is a threat,” Solas said, but he drank, if only to hide his smile.

It was a bit hot, but with a bit of frost magic, it became perfectly safe, and he sipped. The taste was hard to describe; nothing like tea. Strong, with a bitter undernote, but not unpleasant overall.

“What is it?” he asked, curious.

“Some sort of boiled cereal, from what I understand,” Pippa replied. “Apparently it’s all the rage in Antiva and large parts of Tevinter. Do you like it?”

“It’s fine,” he said. “It certainly has… a presence.”

This was apparently not the reaction Pippa had been hoping for, because she frowned at the mug as if it had disappointed her.

“Alright,” she said, and something in her voice sounded like she was taking up a challenge.

* * *

 

Solas didn’t realize this was going to become a habit until the third mug was placed on his desk.

“Less bitter, more sweet,” she said this time. “I was also told something about a floral aftertaste, but feel free to spit it back if it tastes like weeds.”

It did not taste like weeds. A bit leafy, at most, but mostly the sweet-and-sour combination was a bit too contrary on his palate.

“Where do you find these things?” he asked, handing the mug back.

“Gifts people bring,” Pippa replied. “They haul this stuff in from all over Thedas.”

“And you wish me to sample them first?”

“No, I already know what they taste like before I give them to you.”

Solas stared at her for a beat.

“Then why?” he asked.

Pippa looked surprised. She’d not been expecting the question, but he rather thought it was an obvious one.

“I… don’t know. I never see you drinking things just for the pleasure of it. I figured I’d find you something you might like. Should I stop pressing drinks of uncertain origins on you?”

He considered the notion, but ultimately, it seemed like a harmless enough endeavor. It was… strange that such a small, seemingly inconsequential detail about his habits would take up so much of her energy and attention, but sometimes when the Inquisitor was frustrated by larger problems, she took on smaller things to solve. There were worse ways of coping.

“No, it is fine,” he said in the end.

Pippa brightened at his reply so much, that he could not regret his answer.

* * *

 

Once every few weeks, a mug would be placed on his desk, but sometimes, it would also be pressed in his hands when out on the field, in some Inquisition camp.

In the Storm Coast, she gave a steaming dark red liquid to everyone in camp, including the regular troops, but she asked Solas for his opinion on it privately. It tasted like cherries, but dismal ones.

In the Western Approach, she shared with him a small flask of a cool, blue-tinged liquid when his throat was parched. It was soothing, though otherwise bland.

In the Emerald Graves, as they poked through the wine cellar of a half-collapsed villa, she took a wine bottle off a shelf and made an impressed sound at the label.

“Ghislain red. An excellent vintage! They must’ve been in a hurry, if they left this one behind,” she said.

“You know wine, Inquisitor?” Solas asked.

“They’re all grape squeezings to me, Solas. But I know what Josie serves to the Orlesians when she’s trying to impress them, and I can fake good taste with the best of them.” She smiled conspiratorially, and slipped the bottle in the bag. “Dorian is going to like this one. He’s been banned from the Inquisition cellars, poor dear.”

Cassandra called out about finding a key in the other end of the cellar, and they moved on.

But later, in camp, she produced another bottle from her pack, different from the wine one.

“Unfermented wine,” she explained as she poured Solas a glass. “Only for the most discerning teetotaler.”

It did not taste badly, but for some reason he couldn’t get the phrase ‘grape squeezings’ out of his head, and he suspected that impacted his review.

* * *

 

The last mug was two weeks before the final battle with Corypheus.

It was a gloomy day. The rain came down in sheets, and Skyhold was uncharacteristically quiet, lulled into torpor by the overcast weather. The Inquisitor was in her quarters, curled up on the sofa with a fleece blanket over her lap and an abandoned book by her side.

He’d come in only to drop off the report she’d asked him to look over; some experiment of Dagna’s that she wanted him to make sure wouldn’t blow up Skyhold.

“Leave it,” Pippa said. “Sit.”

He sat, and she got up to walk up to the mantle and retrieve a bottle. The liquid inside was honey-yellow, catching the firelight beautifully. She poured two cups and sat back down next to him.

“Cider from Serault,” she explained. “They make it out of these apples that grow on the edge of the Tirashan. They’re very strong, and believe me when I say this is the only time I’ve ever heard apples described by virtue of their potency. But the cider they make out of it is… Well. Just taste.”

He sipped.

It was–

An experience. The taste scratched at something very old in his memory. Though the cider was smooth, he could almost feel the crunch of an apple in his mouth, the juice of Elvhenan’s apples on his lips. Distant, different, just a wisp of the real thing. But it was there in echo–it was closer than he would have thought.

“This is good,” he said, his voice hoarse.

Pippa looked at him, surprised.

“Yeah?”

“Yes.” He wasn’t sure he could say more after that, and he was grateful she merely nodded.

“I’ll get you more.” After that, she pulled the fleece blanket over both their laps.

They sat together, listened to the rain plinking against the glass and the fire roaring, and they did not speak at all. But the silence was comfortable. Solas had the taste of something forgotten on his tongue, and the warm weight of a friend against his shoulder. He would not have known what to say anyway. He could only by grateful for the fleeting moment while it lasted.


End file.
